Big Brother 3, July 17: Feel the Power!

We begin with the theme of the day – Lori talking about how Gerry now has the power because last episode he won the new veto. (By the way, does anybody else think that the schedule for Big Brother this year is really screwed up? They have three episodes in four days, and then nothing again until four days later. It’s almost enough to make you forget what’s been going on.) For his part, Gerry is more excited about it than he thought.

The others in the Group of Six are less than excited, though. Josh tells Lori that Gerry will screw her over (read: screw Josh over) by saving Marcellas. He says he hopes things are good between the two of them, because he didn’t go through all of that for nothing. As we have already seen, the world – nay, the entire universe – revolves around Josh. If Lori is voted out, it messes up Josh’s plans and screws up Josh’s hard work. Poor, poor Josh. Oh, and too bad for Lori, too.

Lisa and Roddy seem pretty confident that Gerry won’t use the veto. ‘Nuff said there.

Gerry decided that Josh wasn’t paranoid enough, so he went to talk to Marcellas just to make Josh even crazier. He tells Marcellas that if the Gang of Six or Five or whatever is about the beautiful people, he doesn’t want any part of it. (Hey, it’s Chill Town II!) He wants them to kiss his ass. Furthermore, he says he should have known that Marcellas was just vamping, not being difficult. He’s angry at himself for giving in to homophobia. Obviously, Marcellas is glad that Gerry won, and hopes he will come through.

Lori also believes Gerry will use the veto, and thinks the two of them have become closer friends. Hmmm. She does think things are starting to get ugly with the others. As Gerry says, Josh is still operating under the old paradigm; he doesn’t think Josh realizes the game has changed. Indeed, the alliance doesn’t know he is about to trump their hand and throw them all into chaos. Well, trump their hand maybe – throw them into chaos? Don’t think so.

Moving on to less weighty issues, Josh has said that he is the ass-slapper. Funny, and I thought he was just an ass. Anyway, he says his girlfriend has an incredible body and he likes to smack her little tushy. I bet she’s thrilled to have that advertised on national television. Anyway, he has decided to do it to all of the women in the house (and some of the men). He says he doesn’t think they all like it (what was his first clue?) but he doesn’t care. Remember, he doesn’t have to care – the universe revolves around him.

On we go to the next luxury competition. After they all get into their bathing suits (isn’t it strange that so many competitions require them to walk around half-naked?), they divide up into two teams – each led by one of the nominees. Marcellas starts to pick the popular folks (Lisa and Eric) but then realizes what kind of behavior he is falling into and goes for Gerry, Amy, and Tonya as well. Lori gets Danielle, Jason, Chiara, Josh, and Roddy. They each have to dress in grass skirts and leis because the prize is a Hawaiian luau, full of food and fun, while the other team gets locked in the house and just has to watch.

It is a contest of memory. The producers have removed six items from the house. Each person has to run in, determine an item that is missing, run back outside, and write it on their team’s marker board (which is hidden from the other team). If they are wrong, back into the house they go. If they are right, somebody else gets to go.

Marcellas’ team takes an early lead as he figures out the globe lamp is gone. Roddy messes up but then figures out that a dining room chair is missing. Lisa basically repeats what Roddy did while Danielle eventually finds something. Then Marcellas’ team really takes off as Jason wanders around the house in a veritable stupor, not having any clue what might be missing. Gerry notices something missing from the chess set, Amy sees only two oars when there should be three, and Eric notices a missing picture. Then Tonya goes in and is completely flummoxed. Meanwhile, Jason finally gets one, then Chiara notices the oar and Josh sees that the bathroom sign is gone. They are all tied up and Lori is as clueless as Tonya.

After an unspecified amount of time, Big Brother finally gives in and says Lori and Tonya can have replacements. So Roddy and Eric head back in. Before Eric leaves, Marcellas mentions something about the sign on the bathroom door. Eric goes straight for it, sees that it is missing, and gives his team the win!

So Marcellas’ team gets the luau, complete with tiki torches straight off the set of Survivor, while the other team tries to make the best of it. Josh is pissed for not winning (as he always is) and says he cooked up all the good stuff in the house while the other team was out partying. Good thing he isn’t a sore loser…

After the partying is done, we get to see a bunch of different sides of Danielle. Mostly, she does impressions – of Tina Turner and other famous people, and of all the houseguests. She’s not bad, and she really cracks some people up. But it is only a brief interlude.

Speaking of interludes, we find out that Marcellas, although he is gay, was once engaged and has had sex with a woman (which puts him one up on Jason, who is straight). Marcellas tells the sad sad story to all the women except Amy, who isn’t around. It’s a perfect story to make them feel more personally bonded to him, and while Marcellas says it was a real moment, he acknowledges that it was strategy as well. At the end, he manages not to cry and says he’s glad he “didn’t pull a Bunky.”

Next we get a mini-saga that reminds me of the British Big Brother 3 house -- bathroom sanitary behavior. It seems that Gerry has a habit of going to the bathroom and then not washing his hands. Then he often follows this up by helping with the food, as when they show him tossing a salad with his hands. Ick.

Danielle is the first one to bring this up, but soon a small crowd gathers to talk about it. Lori stumbles in upon the group and, well, loses it. She gets extremely pissed off that they are all discussing this behind Gerry’s back rather than just going to him about it like adults. As Danielle says of Lori, “That girl lost her ever-loving mind.” Indeed, Danielle “erupts” at Lori while Lisa and some of the others sit back and enjoy the show. Finally, Lori persuades them to bring Gerry in from the back yard to tell him.

Danielle asks Gerry to come in and sit down because they have an “issue” to discuss. They proceed to tell him that they would appreciate it if he would wash his hands after going to the bathroom. He responds that he appreciates their candor and will certainly do as they wish. Later we see him approaching the sink as a surgeon would, hands up in the air so he uses his elbows to turn on the tap. But while the problem was solved in part due to Lori pushing them to talk to Gerry, Danielle says Lori is digging a hole and she will be voted out if this keeps up.

Next up in the line of people who are doing things that annoy others is Amy, who says she just doesn’t pay as much attention to the others. We are shown Lisa and Chiara in the shower together (don’t get your hopes up – they appear to have bathing suits or something on) and they invite Amy in as she walks by. She politely turns them down, but one of them makes a comment about how they were just trying to include her in things and make a connection. A three-woman shower as a connection? Hmmm… Bet that would increase the live feed subscriber numbers! Anyway, she says if she is happy, she’s not worried about if she makes others happy.

Moving away from personality issues (at least as much as you can in this game) and back to strategy, we see Gerry telling Marcellas that he feels good about having the veto and about himself. He says he has a brother-in-law who is black and two beautiful nephews who are black, and he really enjoys the company of his gay friends, so he should not have fallen prey to the bigotry that overtook the house in those first few hours or days (he doesn’t actually use the word “bigotry,” but that’s definitely the implication). He has to be true to himself and his integrity.

Marcellas says he doesn’t want to be vetoed because he’s the gay black guy, but because it’s good strategy to do so. Hey, Marcellas, don’t look a gift horse in the mouth!

Anyway, Gerry talks to Danielle about the situation, claiming it’s homophobic and racist to pick on Marcellas. She doesn’t buy it. In fact, Gerry is starting to rub her the wrong way. So she goes and tells Chiara and Lisa what Gerry said, managing to get a promise from Lisa that Danielle won’t be nominated if Gerry vetoes Marcellas. She is definitely starting to play the game, saying that she wants to let Gerry think she’s with him and let the others think she’s with them.

Lisa says it would be a mark against Gerry if he vetoes her decision. Josh still thinks he isn’t “dumb enough” to use it, while Gerry says he hopes Lisa is “smart enough” to know that Josh needs to go. Roddy says that if Gerry goes against the alliance, he is in big trouble and he knows it. Ooooooh, scary. He might find a horse’s head in his bed or something.

We finally get to the long-awaited Veto Meeting. Gerry begins by giving Lori and Marcellas a chance to explain why he should veto their nomination. Lori cries as she says she went out on a limb to save Marcellas due to everything being based on a bad first impression. Frankly, I’m not quite sure what she was talking about. Marcellas says something equally mystifying about how the decision was made before they all knew about the alliance and how he’s down with everybody now but it took a while to get down. Lisa says privately that she agreed with what Marcellas said, but I’m still trying to figure out exactly what he did say! All that seems certain is that everybody knows about the alliance, and we’ve seen from experience on both Big Brother and Survivor that public alliances just don’t work. They need to be secret or they’re dead in the water.

Anyway, to almost nobody’s surprise (except perhaps Josh), Gerry vetoes Marcellas. Marcellas later goes on about how Gerry gave him his life back, threw himself on the knife, etc. Gerry says that he who is without sin should cast the first stone, and so Gerry will cast it at himself. (Huh? Is he saying he is without sin?) He says he allowed himself to pick on Marcellas because he is gay and black, and he should have known better. He must confront the racism and demons because it is sinful. He says his soul is not for sale and if he could, he would sacrifice himself in Marcellas’ place.

So, the ball is back in Lisa’s court as she has to nominate somebody else. She says there is nobody she wants out at this point, so she will use the same criteria she used for the first two. She picks Amy because Amy hasn’t really connected well with her. Amy responds with a little cheer! She says you can’t win every time, so you need to keep yourself composed. Chiara says Amy handled it like a pro.

But now we get to the amusing part. Amy tells the camera that everybody told her not to worry about it because she was safe. Then Lori tells the camera that she feels safe. Er, one of you is wrong.

Gerry, in a separate discussion with some of the non-alliance members says he just hopes if any of them win HoH, they will watch his back. Yes, indeed, he’d better hope that. But I suspect if Danielle wins HoH, she just might try to cater favor with the alliance by putting Gerry up. It should be interesting.

Before we leave for the evening, we get a few more opinions from houseguests. Marcellas says Josh is the Anti-Christ, a cancer in the organism that is the BB house. Josh says Gerry can go f*** himself if he is accusing Josh of racism and prejudice. He says Gerry just wrote himself a ticket home. Well, so far Josh has been wrong about, well, everything, so we’ll see how this prediction pans out.

Lisa says Gerry is on the chopping block unless he can get HoH and save himself for a week (she seems to forget that he has allies too). Roddy puts things into perhaps the best perspective by saying that in life’s big picture, Gerry has gotten points for himself – but not in this game.

David Bloomberg is the Editor of RealityNewsOnline, and can be reached at rno@pobox.com.

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